Labor history project needs sponsors
VANCOUVER — A labor history
project at the Clark County Historical
Museum is still looking for financial
sponsorships from individual union
members and union shops.
The exhibit, “Tools of the Trade: A
History of Labor in Southwest Wash-
ington,” opens at the museum July 11
and will run for 18 months.
The Washington State Labor Coun-
cil will hold two receptions at the mu-
seum during its statewide convention at
the Vancouver Hilton & Convention
Center July 25-27.
The museum also is planning a se-
ries of public education programs that
will run during the exhibit. The mu-
seum is working in partnership with
Washington State University-Vancou-
ver History Department, the NW Folk-
life Center, and the Vancouver Com-
munity Library to produce and host the
labor-specific programs.
The labor history program will
showcase the significant role that work-
ers and their unions played in building
the community, and will include arti-
facts, oral histories, and other materials
related to the labor movement in Van-
couver and Southwest Washington.
Additional funds are needed now to
complete the exhibit project.
Union shops and community busi-
nesses that donate $500 will be featured
in the exhibit gallery on an interpretive
panel highlighting the contribution.
Companies donating at the $1,000 level
will get the same, plus have their logo
featured on an exhibit banner that will
hang on the front of the museum build-
ing. Businesses that contribute $2,000
will get those two items, plus have their
logo featured on media advertising that
the museum produces in conjunction
with the exhibit.
Individual union members who do-
nate in whatever dollar amount they
can afford ($20, $50, $75, $100 or
more), will be acknowledged in a
“Rolodex” that will be featured in the
exhibit gallery. The “Rolodex” will list
union members grouped by their dona-
tion amount and by union affiliation.
Deadline to participate is June 1.
The Clark County Historical Soci-
ety and Museum is a non-profit 501 (c)
3 organization.
Donations can be made online at
www.cchmuseum.org.
Checks can be sent to: Clark
County Historical Museum Labor
Exhibit, Clark County Historical
Museum, 1511 Main Street, Vancou-
ver, Wash., 98660
For more information, call Susan
Tissot, executive director of the Clark
County Historical Museum, at 360-
993-5679, or email her at tissots@paci-
fier.com.
Bill Trites watches as his catch of the day is weighed. The 13-pound salmon
proved to be a winner on a slow fishing day on the Willamette River.
Guide Dogs
the big winner
at Machinists
salmon derby
Guide Dogs of America (GDA) was
the big winner at the third annual
Salmon Fishing Derby May 4 spon-
sored by Machinists District W24. Un-
seasonably warm weather scared away
the fish, but not fishermen and women,
who donated $10,000 to the cause.
In three years the fishing derby has
collected $34,000 for Guide Dogs.
The International Association of
Machinists founded GDA in 1948 in
Sylmar, California, to train and provide
guide dogs to the blind, free of charge.
The organization receives no govern-
ment funding. “We depend solely on
fundraising events like this, voluntary
donations and bequests,” said Guide
Dogs director and derby participant
MAY 17, 2013
NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS
Guide Dogs in training — Tabor, the
yellow lab on the left, and Welby, a
black lab, were special guests at the
Machinists District W24 salmon
derby luncheon on May 4.
Dale Hartford, noting that to breed,
raise and train one guide dog costs
$38,000.
The fishing derby launched from
the docks of RiverPlace Marina in
downtown Portland at 5 a.m. For the
next eight hours, 19 professional fish-
ing guides steered four-person teams
through the Willamette River in search
of the big fish. The winning catch was a
13-pound salmon reeled in by Bill
Trites. It was Trites’ first salmon catch
ever. Winner of the sturgeon derby (for
most total inches of sturgeon landed,
catch and release) was Jon Holden,
with 635 inches. Holden is a member
of Machinists District Lodge 751 in
Seattle.
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